UNBIASED - Special Report: Colorado Supreme Court Removes Trump from the State's 2024 Ballot.

Episode Date: December 20, 2023

Last night, the Colorado Supreme Court issued a decision removing former President Trump from the state's 2024 ballot. In this special report, we'll review:  The basis for the lawsuit at hand (Anderson v. Griswold), A brief history of the disqualification clause,  The lower court's ruling,  The Colorado Supreme Court's majority opinion and dissents, The likely appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States and what happens to the Colorado Supreme Court's decision in the meantime, The reactions from other Republican presidential candidates. After listening, should you have any other questions, please submit them here.  Friday's podcast episode will include a Q&A segment to wrap up this discussion.If you enjoyed this episode, please leave me a review and share it with those you know that also appreciate unbiased news!Subscribe to Jordan's weekly free newsletter featuring hot topics in the news, trending lawsuits, and more.Follow Jordan on Instagram and TikTok.All sources for this episode can be found here.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Kick off an exciting football season with BetMGM, an official sportsbook partner of the National Football League. Yard after yard, down after down, the sportsbook born in Vegas gives you the chance to take action to the end zone and celebrate every highlight reel play. And as an official sportsbook partner of the NFL, BetMGM is the best place to fuel your football fandom on every game day. With a variety of exciting features,

BetMGM offers you plenty of seamless ways to jump straight onto the gridiron and to embrace peak sports action. Ready for another season of gridiron glory? What are you waiting for? Get off the bench, into the huddle, and head for the end zone all season long. Visit BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older. Ontario only.

Please gamble responsibly. Gambling problem? For free assistance, call the Connex Ontario Helpline at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. You are listening to the Jordan is my lawyer podcast, your favorite source of unbiased

news and legal analysis. Enjoy the show. Welcome back to the Jordan is my lawyer podcast. Happy Wednesday. I know what you're thinking. It's not Tuesday. It's not Friday. What am I doing here? Well, the reality is last night, the Colorado Supreme Court released a pretty important decision that almost immediately I was getting questions from you guys about what this decision means and why the decision was what it was. So I just figured, you know what, let me get ahead of it and let me do a special report because every so often there's certain events that I feel are worthy of these sort of special reports. So here we go.

Let's get into it. The story everyone's been waiting for, the question everyone has, how did Donald Trump get taken off the ballot in Colorado? Let's walk through it. First and foremost, this case, it's called Anderson versus Griswold, and it was brought in Colorado by some voters in Colorado seeking to disqualify Donald Trump from the 2024 ballot based on one particular clause of the Constitution. This clause is called the Disqualification Clause. And what the Disqualification Clause says is this, no person shall be a senator or representative in Congress or elector of president and vice president or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States or under any state,

who previously took an oath to support the Constitution and has since engaged in insurrection or rebellion against it, or has given aid or comfort to enemies thereof. Now, the argument is that Donald Trump is disqualified from running for president under this clause because he engaged in insurrection on January 6th. Therefore, he's disqualified. That is the argument from the plaintiffs. But the disqualification clause is extremely complex for a couple of reasons. Number one, this clause was enacted following the Civil War for the purpose of prohibiting those officials at the time that supported the Confederacy from ever holding office again. But the Constitution never provided any guidance as to how and when to enforce it. So it was enacted for the purpose of prohibiting these, you know, Confederacy supporting officials from holding office. But then how is it supposed to be used going forward when we don't have officials necessarily supporting the Confederacy-supporting officials from holding office, but then how is it supposed

to be used going forward when we don't have officials necessarily supporting the Confederacy? And the second reason it's complex is because the clause hasn't really been interpreted in the modern era. Following its enactment, which was after the Civil War, there were two conflicting rulings as to how this clause was supposed to be interpreted. Both of these rulings were by the same judge, coincidentally. So the judge was first in a lower court. He eventually ended up on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States, but he basically issued two conflicting rulings, one saying that the disqualification clause is self-executing, and another ruling that said the disqualification clause is not self-executing, meaning it requires some sort

of act from Congress in order to take effect. So, and I don't want to get too much into those rulings back in the 1800s. If you do want more on that, I did release an episode on October 31st on Halloween where I really dive in to the background of the disqualification clause. But all of this to say, there's a lot of confusion surrounding this particular clause and not much clarity at all. Despite this lack of clarity, though, many lawsuits were filed around the country in order to prevent Donald Trump from appearing on the ballot in various states, not just in Colorado, but also in Florida, New Hampshire, Michigan, Arizona, Minnesota, to name a few. But all of the lawsuits were based on the same premise, that Trump engaged

in insurrection on January 6th and therefore should be prohibited from appearing on these states' ballots and holding office in the future. The judges overseeing the case in Arizona, Minnesota, and Michigan all declined to remove Trump from their states' ballots. The New Hampshire case and the Florida cases were both dismissed in the early stages. Now, the lawsuit in Florida was dismissed because the plaintiffs lacked standing in order to sue. And this is something you've heard me talk about before. Basically, to bring a lawsuit, you have to have a legal right to sue. You have to have suffered some sort of injury or at least are threatened with some sort of injury. And so

you're trying to stop something from happening and causing injury to you, right? And on top of that injury, the injury also has to be a particularized injury to the person suing. So the Florida judge found that the plaintiff's alleged injury when they filed this lawsuit, the injury they were alleging was not particular to them, and therefore they didn't have the requisite standing to bring this lawsuit. On top of that, the judge also found that individual citizens, meaning you and I, private citizens, do not have standing to challenge whether another individual is qualified to hold office. And in coming to that conclusion, the judge cited to a bunch of other cases, including a case where some plaintiffs were challenging President Obama's eligibility for president,

another case where plaintiffs were challenging Kamala Harris's eligibility for vice president. So she cited all of these different rulings in her dismissal. So for those reasons, the case was dismissed. And Donald Trump then tries to get the Colorado case dismissed for the same reasons that the Florida judge dismissed the Florida case. But the Colorado court rejected those arguments and let the case go forward. So the Colorado trial in the lower court starts at the end of October. And prior to its start, because again, as I said, this is such a complex issue, the judge wrote out a list of questions that she wanted the parties to answer throughout the

trial. Specifically, the judge wanted the parties to address how often and on what basis the secretary of state excludes candidates based on constitutional deficiencies. She wanted the parties to address whether the disqualification clause applies to presidents. She wanted the parties to address whether the clause is self-executing or needs an act of Congress to take effect, the meaning of insurrection and engaged as used in the disqualification clause, and whether Trump's actions on January 6th rose to the level of insurrection. So she sets forth this list of, I read you the most important ones for purposes of this

discussion, but there were a few others too. She puts forth this list. She says, I want you guys to address all of these issues throughout this trial so I can make the best decision possible. The trial happens a few weeks after closing arguments. The judge issues her ruling. And what the judge said is, yes, Donald Trump engaged in insurrection on January 6th, but the disqualification clause does not apply to presidents, and therefore he cannot be disqualified from the ballot. Because remember, the disqualification clause specifically names senators, representatives, and presidential electors, which is different than the president. And it also says any office, civil or military,

under the United States. But still, the judge ruled that this does not include the office of the presidency. And if the framers wanted the presidency included, they would have said that. So naturally, following that ruling, the plaintiffs appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court, and they try once more to get Trump removed from the ballot. The Colorado Supreme Court hears oral arguments on December 6th, which focused primarily on whether the clause applies to presidents, because that was the main issue following the lower court's decision. During arguments, the justices weren't really obviously leaning in any sort of way. They seemed pretty divided at times. They were pushing back

on arguments from both Trump and the challengers. And basically, the arguments boil down to this. The challengers' main point was that the phrase, any office, civil or military, under the United States includes the presidency. Meanwhile, the other side was arguing that the president was specifically left out. If the framers wanted to include the president, they would have. So other points were argued too, you know, like whether January 6th rose to the level of insurrection or instead was just a riot, but the primary focus was on this issue of whether the clause applies to presidents. The justices mull over the case for about two weeks. And on Tuesday, in a four to three decision, very close decision, ruled that Donald Trump is

not an eligible presidential candidate. More specifically, what their ruling said was that we agree with the lower court's ruling that Donald Trump engaged in insurrection, but this clause does in fact apply to the president. Now, this ruling is about 213 pages. I, of course, have it linked for you, but we're going to sum it up. The court wrote that there was enough evidence to conclude that, quote, the drafters of this amendment intended the phrase any office to be broadly inclusive and certainly to include the presidency. They continue on and the majority writes, quote, it seems most likely that the presidency is not specifically included because it is so evidently in office. A conclusion that the presidency is something other than an office under the United States is fundamentally at odds with the idea that all government officials, including the president,

serve we the people, end quote. So that is their decision in a nutshell, right? If we were just to pick out the most important excerpts that speak to the ultimate decision, that is what you need to know. Now, a couple of other things you should know is that the decision out of the Colorado Supreme Court was put on hold pending appeal until January 4th. What does that mean? That means that this decision will not take effect until January 4th to give the parties time to appeal. And if the parties appeal, then this decision really won't take effect, right? So Trump has already said he'll be appealing the case to the Supreme Court of the United States, which is the next court up. Immediately after the ruling, a Trump campaign spokesperson said, quote,

The Colorado Supreme Court issued a completely flawed decision tonight, and we will swiftly file an appeal to the United States Supreme Court and a concurrent request for a stay of this deeply undemocratic decision. We have full confidence that the U.S. Supreme Court will quickly rule in our favor and finally put an end to these un-American lawsuits, end quote. Now, that concurrent request that was briefly mentioned in that statement just means that Trump's team is going to ask the Supreme Court to permanently put the Colorado Supreme Court's decision on hold until the Supreme Court of the United States renders its own decision on the matter. So a stay is, you know, staying the Colorado's decision so it doesn't take effect.

So here's the thing. Colorado's Secretary of State has long said that this issue needs to be resolved by January 5th because that is when the candidates are finalized for the ballot. But remember, the Colorado Supreme Court's decision is on hold pending appeal until January 4th. So let's just say hypothetically, Donald Trump appeals in the next two days. The Colorado Supreme Court's decision is paused until the Supreme Court renders its decision, which means that Trump will most likely be on Colorado's primary ballot. The only way he wouldn't be on the Colorado ballot is if the Supreme Court rejected the case in the next two to three weeks. They said, we're not going to hear this. And in that case, the Colorado Supreme Court decision would stand. The decision would go into effect and Trump's name would not appear on the ballot. I hope that makes sense to you, right? So I guess just to reiterate

one more time, because Trump is going to appeal this so quickly, the Colorado Supreme Court's decision will be on hold. It will not be in effect until the Supreme Court makes their decision. Either they're not going to hear the case, the Colorado Supreme Court decision stands, or they are going to hear the case. And from there, they could either say, we're going to put this decision on hold until we hear arguments and we render a decision. Or maybe they just say, no, Colorado Supreme Court decision can't take effect, and it's more of an immediate response from the Supreme Court. But time will tell. We will see

what the Supreme Court does in the next few days. Now, of the three justices that dissented in the Colorado Supreme Court decision, meaning they wouldn't have disqualified Trump from the ballot. One cited due process concerns. He said he felt that the disqualification clause is not self-executing and does require legislation enacted by Congress in order to enforce it, which did not happen here. Another dissenting justice wrote that Colorado election law, quote, was not enacted to decide whether a candidate engaged in insurrection, end quote, and that justice further said he would have dismissed the challenge in the first place. And the third dissenting justice wrote that she didn't think Colorado state courts had the authority to decide whether a presidential candidate can be disqualified under the

insurrectionist ban, and also said that the lower court should have dismissed this case. So let's wrap this conversation up by talking about what Trump's fellow candidates are saying about this ruling. First off, Vivek Ramaswamy, he wrote on X shortly after the ruling, quote, I pledge to withdraw from the Colorado GOP primary ballot until Trump is allowed to be on the ballot, and I demand that Ron DeSantis, Chris Christie, and Nikki Haley do the same, or else they are tacitly endorsing this illegal maneuver which will have disastrous consequences for our country. End quote. Colorado's Republican Party then tweeted back at Vivek saying, quote, you won't have to because we will withdraw from the primary as a party and convert to a pure caucus system if this is allowed

to stand, end quote. Nikki Haley said ballot decisions should not be left to the court, saying, quote, we don't need to have judges making these decisions. We need voters to make these decisions, end quote. And Chris Christie said something along similar lines. He said, quote, Donald Trump should not be prevented from being president by any court. He should be prevented from being president of the United States by the voters of this country, end quote. And as of the time I'm recording this episode, Ron DeSantis had not yet said anything, but I'm sure he will have something to say. So that is what I feel you need to know about Anderson versus Griswold.

Now, let me just say this. I tried to crank this episode out as quickly as I could. Quick turnaround time. Therefore, I probably didn't hit on every single question that you had. If I didn't hit on a question and there is something that you're still confused about, you can always reach out to me on my website. I have a contact form there. Submit your questions there and that way for Friday's episode, I can do a little Q&A segment for the questions that you guys do have and kind of just really put a bow on this conversation so

it's fully understood and everything is clear. Stay tuned, of course, for updates out of the Supreme Court. And with that, I will talk to you on Friday.